


Hero

by stharridan



Series: Bells and Candy [13]
Category: Bleach
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-30
Updated: 2012-05-30
Packaged: 2017-11-06 07:57:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/416548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stharridan/pseuds/stharridan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yachiru thinks he's a hero, and that, Kenpachi guesses, is good enough for him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hero

Heroes are people who save damsels in distress and help them out of their misery and rescue them from evil. Heroes are the keys to salvation for the world, the hands that will banish the encroaching darkness, that will triumph over the wicked.

Kenpachi doesn't think he's a hero. He laughs and spits and jeers at the term. Back in the 80th District, there is no such thing as a "hero." Everyone's evil, everyone's just striving to live for themselves. There is no salvation when it comes to living there. It's like a hellhole filled to the brim with demons who pilfer and plunder, murder and rape, and each day is overshadowed by an evil that seems to have come from the very depths of the Fire.

Kenpachi doesn't do all those things, but he knows that he's not a hero. He doesn't kill on purpose – he just kills to survive. Those who want to fuck with him will be dead so fast that they wouldn't know what hit them. But that's just about it. He doesn't believe in stealing, says that it's just for the weak who can't rely on themselves to survive. And he doesn't even want to go into the matter of rape. He had lived with a woman in that shithole for so long, and the only times when he managed to get into Yachiru's yukata was initiated by either gentle touches or flared tempers. Aside from that, he never really dared to touch her.

It's surprising, coming from a man of his stature. Rough, coarse, everything one will expect from a person who originated from the lower districts. And he came from the worst, most violent district, nonetheless. Surely he doesn't have any virtues any longer, having been swallowed up by the bloody jaws of the 80th.

Kenpachi hates it whenever they think that way. Whenever he comes across grocery stores, or an old candy shop to indulge the little brat's needs, the customers would scurry out or cower in the back the moment they lay eyes on him. It's not like _everyone_ who comes from the lower districts has no moral values. Hell, Yachiru was the one who taught him table manners, and she'd been living in the 80th for gods-know-how-long. Sure, she didn't _originate_ from there, but being somewhere with a drastic atmosphere can do things to a person's mind. Yachiru, apparently, was one of a handful who managed to actually keep their sanity in check.

Back in those days, Kenpachi had been on the verge of losing his sanity. He still claims that he's lost part of it, while the other half had been salvaged by the woman. He doesn't admit it though, preferring to keep it to himself.

But when she died, everything, his world, came crashing down on him. It was only through the intervention of the brat that he once again managed to keep his mentality in check.

It's been years since he first saw her back in the 79th. Named her Yachiru on the spot in remembrance of the woman, though he knows that this time, the roles are reversed – he's the one who has to teach her table manners. They're still somewhere in the Rukongai, trying to find their way out, trudging through to get to the Seireitei, and he still doesn't know just what spurred him into taking the kid along. He still doesn't get why he chose to name her after the one woman he personally looked up to. The kid's nothing like the woman. Stubborn, yes, but that seems to be the only trait they share.

Maybe it was the look in her eyes that made him pick her up. The curiosity in those ruby irises only further enhanced his interest. He doesn't like children. He used to glare and growl at them back in the 80th, and he had to admit that it was damn fun watching them scurry around crying for their mothers. But Yachiru had told him not to do that, said that the children were afraid of him and hadn't done anything to him to warrant such treatment.

Maybe what Yachiru had said about kids made him take her in. The woman wanted to have children of her own anyway, so this, Kenpachi guesses, is just a way of fulfilling her wish. Even if he has to suffer through countless sleepless nights trying to get the brat to fall asleep, and annoying potty breaks during the course of their journey.

But he still can't ignore the feeling he got when he first laid eyes on her. Amidst the carnage, there was that innocence that shone through. A ray of hope, if he could be so bold to regard her as such. A little too dramatic, he muses, but still sort of accurate. It wasn't a sensation that he's too familiar with. It wasn't something that he got whenever he was with the brat's namesake. It was an entirely new, foreign sensation. He felt a little light-headed at first, confused, puzzled, the flare of anger in which he had immersed himself during the course of the homicide lifting as if a wind was trying to blow it away. It felt slightly like the time when he first came to terms with his budding relationship with the woman, with a few exceptions.

It felt good. To know that one wasn't the only person there to witness such a violent act was somewhat of a solace. A child, she wasn't supposed to see all this. Kenpachi, to this day, still has the feeling that he's the one who had killed her parents by accident. He can't remember anything after Yachiru's death until the moment where he first laid eyes on the baby. It was like a wake-up call. A rather odd one at that.

When the baby wraps her little hand around his long finger, Kenpachi finds himself unable to stop grinning. He tries to mask it with a frown, but always he ends up smiling to himself. There's just something in the way she looks at him that tickles the sides of his heart like nothing else can. Everything seems to become a little clearer, the goal that he once stashed away in the back of his mind after Yachiru's death steps forth from the shadows. It's almost like he can see the future. A future that only focuses on him and the brat, a reflection of who he is and who he's going to be.

The woman had told him many times that she was convinced of his abilities to climb up the ranks of the Seireitei. Due to his powerful spiritual pressure, he's capable of being one of the most feared shinigami in Soul Society. He didn't really believe it back in the days, thinking that she was just saying it for the sake of cheering him up. It was a hard life back then, and Kenpachi has to admit that she didn't have the best jokes and sayings around to lighten the mood.

But now he's convinced that he can actually make it to the Seireitei and be a renowned shinigami. Maybe a leader of one of the divisions with the brat as his little assistant. Now he finds himself mulling over the numerous possibilities of life in the Seireitei. He dreams of good food, warm, clean clothes, a bath that he can actually stretch out in and not care whether or not the walls have peepholes in them. Occasionally, he brushes all the luxuries off with a scoff, thinking that they aren't possible since it's going to be a military setting, but seeing the way the child, Yachiru, struggles with short food supply and thin, miserable clothing, he hopes that they can find a better life in the Seireitei.

Never has he been so optimistic in life before. Back in the 80th, he did have his moments wherein he would listen to Yachiru's stories about the Seireitei. He'd imagine their life together and, rather reluctantly, the large private living quarters that they'd share along with a few kids of their own. They'd start a family, just like how she wanted. But the moment she died, he'd lost his anchor.

But Kenpachi had saved the child from the merciless streets of the 79th, and from that moment on, she's the one who holds the key to his resurrection. Without her, Kenpachi's certain that he won't be able to make it out of the encroaching insanity. He knows that he somehow owes her, but the expression in her eyes whenever she looks at him seems like she's the one who's grateful to him. She still can't talk coherently, but through her glances and long stares, he can feel the gratitude that she's trying to convey.

Maybe it's just him being unreasonable or too caught up in the moment. Maybe it's because he doesn't believe in heroes that he doesn't see himself as one worth looking up to.

But Yachiru thinks he's a hero, and that, he guesses, is good enough for him.


End file.
